by Joey W. Hill
Despite her chiding to him to be still, he stroked his large fingertips down the side of her face. “I haven’t felt alone lately,” he said. “I hope you’ve felt the same.”
She pressed her lips to his hand again in answer. The gesture seemed to please him. She returned to cleaning the wounds. Since she could tell from his stiffening that the soap burned with particular intensity on the arrow injury, she offered the distraction of another question.
“Will you tell me why Marcellus disturbs you?”
He seemed surprised she’d noticed, but shrugged. “His existence. You’re right; in my world, there’s a lot of debate about there being an afterlife, God, heaven, angels, all of it. I’ve always believed there’s Something there, but in that nebulous way a lot of us do, not really sure, just…hoping. Hoping with all our heart and soul, especially when we brush with death or as we get older. And yet, there he is. An angel, just as real and immediate as this couch, as you and me. Proof of something that millions of us worry and ponder—poof—all right there. It’s kind of a lot to take in.”
“So fighting an enemy who suddenly appeared on my island, and then passing through a magic portal into two vastly different worlds, that’s not unusual. But seeing an angel is life-changing?”
He grinned. “Yeah, smartass. It is. I’m used to the other stuff.”
“I’m glad one of us was.” She set aside the red-tinged water, but seeing that hue unsettled her anew. She took it back to the sink and dumped it. As she turned on the left spigot this time, she jumped back as heated water splashed onto her hand.
“The water is hot,” she marveled, putting her hand back beneath it.
“Yeah. The trailer has a solar water heater hook up outside. These units are pretty good about taking care of basic needs. They’re not opulent, partially for the reasons Clara mentioned about the technology transitions, but they’re comfortable. Since Lady Yvette could have done exactly what she threatened, put us in a couple cages stuck in a leaky tent, this is the interdimensional Marriott as far as I’m concerned.”
She digested the unfamiliar term, and filed it away as a question for a later time. Returning to sit cross-legged next to him, she touched his chest below the arrow wound and stroked him, concerned. She wanted to do more for him. In the shadowed confines of the wagon, with no immediate threat to either of them, he looked tired. “There are clean clothes back there.” She gestured to a closet she’d peered into while dumping the water. “They do appear to be in your size.”
There were some that seemed to fit her own dimensions, unfamiliar garments she was keenly interested to explore, but their appeal was not enough to draw her from his side. Threading her fingers through the light fur over his pectorals, she made her way down to rest her hand on the layers of muscle over his abdomen. She wasn’t trying to be enticing, not exactly, but seeing her fingers, without claws, touching his skin, not having to worry about scratching him…she suddenly couldn’t get enough of being able to do that.
“I’ll wait until after Charlie gets here. I’d love nothing better than to stretch out on the bed and get a few hours of sleep, but I’m not going to do it until we’re all squared away. Keep me awake until she gets here.”
Though he’d laid his hand on hers and was clasping her wrist as her fingers moved upon him, he did look like he was having trouble staying conscious, which worried her further. The arrow wound had been so close to his heart, though he’d said it had passed through the meat of his shoulder. He had so many scars. Too many. Those she’d put on him, those round, shiny scars he said were bullets. Multiple wounds from scrapes and tears to his flesh in the dangerous work he’d done before he’d come to her. She was pretty sure he didn’t want to answer questions about that right now, though.
“Can you tell me how the Circus came about?”
“I’m not really sure. Not even Maddock knows, I don’t think. He stumbled upon it when he was first testing the portal system. In those early days, when he could open one, he’d just step through and see what was on the other side. Crazy bastard. Walked out right between a brontosaurus’s feet one time. Those are giant beasts that walked the earth thousands of years before any humans did. Another time, he stepped into a full scale battle that happened several hundred years before my time. Once he emerged into an empty part of space that didn’t even seem like it was part of our world at all.”
“Amazing,” she murmured.
“The first time he encountered the Circus,” John continued, “he walked through a portal straight into Yvette’s quarters. I think she was just stepping out of her bathtub. He’s lucky he survived that. Apparently the fireworks shook the foundation of the universe. As you’ve likely guessed, she’s as much sorceress as vampire. The complex charms and protections on this place are her work, though rumor has it she had the help of a Dark Guardian to set it up, which is similar to an angel, only he works for the Underworld side of things.”
“She is hard to classify,” Medusa said, thinking of the woman’s arousing touch, her cool eyes. “Frightening, but…”
“Fascinating. Like looking into a snake’s eyes. Can’t look away even as it’s about to eat you.” John was teasing her, but he touched Earthson’s head where the small snake was weaving through the locks of hair tangled over her shoulder. “He seems pretty excited about things.”
“It was the dragons. Earthson has always wanted to be a dragon," she said, caressing the snake. “He wants to spit streams of flame. I see it in his dreams.”
“He'd catch your hair on fire.”
“That is what Ratqueen thinks. But there's no reason not to dream.”
“True enough.” John’s lips quirked. “Yvette herself is pretty closed-mouth about how the Circus came about, but Maddock’s found evidence of its existence as far back as the 1700s. They enter into the mundane world, do a few shows, and then disappear again into this pocket between worlds. There are quite a few of those, and she knows all of them, a secret map in her head for those who need to stay out of reach of the ‘real world.’”
“Like me.”
“Like you.” He threaded his hand through her hair. “In our world, we’ve had what we call ‘freak shows’ for a long time in carnival environments. People who exaggerate features or create illusions to dupe people into thinking they’re seeing fantastic things not seen anywhere else. The Circus is the real deal.”
“Like the dragons.”
“Yeah. Among other things. Once you feel comfortable, I think you’ll love exploring this place. We’ll figure out the boundary thing Yvette mentioned so you won’t have to worry about the spell leaving you. How do you like being able to look at everyone?”
“It is…I can’t really wrap my mind around it yet.” She lifted her gaze to meet his. “But I do know the ability to look at you again makes things seem far more balanced. I am not so afraid to be away from my home as I thought I would be. I think that is because you are with me.”
His gaze stilled on her face. The significance of all that had occurred in such a short time abruptly swamped her, and he must have felt it himself, for he clasped both her upper arms and drew her out of her kneeling position to tumble her in his lap.
“Your shoulder.”
“Don’t give a damn about it,” he said, claiming her for a deep kiss. She melted into his hold, making a noise in her throat at the demand of his mouth and tongue, far more insistent than she would have expected, given his physical state.
When he lifted his head, keeping her close, his eyes on her were the kind of sharp that pierced her to the core. “That balance thing? Same goes. When she touched you, I felt your desire.”
“I couldn’t—”
“There’s no shame in it. She can do it to anyone she chooses. Hell, if she’d wanted to get us hot enough to fuck each other right there in front of everyone, she would have. And she came damn near close. Before she toned it down, I would have bled out while wanting to eat you alive.”
She felt it in his
grip, the heat of his eyes, and trembled. “It is wrong of her, to manipulate people that way.”
“She only pulls on what’s there. You think I haven’t desired you like that before, without a vampire’s help? After all we’ve been through, I have this primal urge just to take you right now, reassure myself we’re both alive, and that you’re with me, all of you.”
“I am,” she said, unnerved by the sudden harshness of his voice. She put both hands on his face. “If that is what you desire, John Pierce, my body is yours to take, even in this moment. Whatever I can do to give you ease.”
She’d told him that there was often something in the way he made demands of her that took her back to those early, fervent days where she was swamped with nothing but pure desire to serve the Goddess. Only this was also wrapped up with her own womanly desires, and she hadn’t hesitated to tell him what she wished now.
That glint returned to his eye. “Something else I noticed. It seems there are now way too many males around that have caught your attention.”
Her gaze slid over him. “I have seen nothing yet I like more than what is beneath my touch now.”
The resulting intensity in his gaze made her think he might take her offer, and her body responded eagerly to the idea, no matter the wisdom of pushing him toward sex when his wound was still not fully dressed. But then they heard footsteps circling the wagon, and a light rap on the door.
“Hello? It’s Charlie.”
Catching her nape, John gave her one more kiss, still so brutally demanding she made a surprised noise in the back of her throat, her heart leaping. He eased her back. “On account,” he promised.
He started to rise, but she shook her head. Pressing him against the cushion, she went to open the door he’d latched.
Charlie was shorter than Medusa by almost half a foot. She wasn’t a dwarf like Gundar, but she was definitely very small, her body possessing a willowy thinness under a dark blue dress of a soft-looking fabric that clung to what curves she had. She had long reddish gold hair, straight and tied back in a tail, and a sprinkling of freckles on her fair skinned arms and face.
She remembered Yvette saying the woman was blind when she tilted her face but didn’t meet Medusa’s eyes. Her gaze was unfocused and cloudy blue. When Medusa looked into her eyes, a wave of dizziness made her grab the wall of the wagon next to the steps to steady herself.
“Hold on.” The woman’s hands were on her, startlingly strong, guiding her back into the wagon to ease her onto the couch next to John. “You’ve had an abundance of time and dimension shifts today. That’s catching up to you.”
Her voice was the flow of water, carrying along the listener, taking away the need to do anything but drift. A sensual undercurrent kept the waters flowing in a pleasant swirl over the senses and exposed skin. “First things first.”
The woman set a box of medical supplies on a side table and curled up on the opposite side of John Pierce, her knees folded beneath her. She bent her head in a gesture of respect. “May I touch you, sir? Treat your wounds?”
“You may,” he said, studying her with a perceptive look Medusa couldn’t decipher. Another question for later.
Charlie probed the arrow wound. “You did a good job cleaning all of these,” she said absently. “I’ll just sterilize this one a little more.”
She used a sharp smelling fluid and a gauze pad. The application made John stiffen again, his fingers curling into his knee, but otherwise he issued no complaint. Still, Medusa put her hand on his and held on. When he sent her a relaxed smile, she felt better, though it seemed like the contact also helped him.
“No infection, no splinters. You were fortunate.” Charlie had her palms flat on both sides of the wound, one on his chest, one against his back, and Medusa saw a cool blue and white light shimmering below the touch on either side. “I’ll put some salve on it and the snake bites and give you an antibiotic. A couple days of rest will handle the bulk of the healing. I don’t recommend you participate in any strenuous work for the next forty-eight hours. I’ll let Yvette know.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“Respectfully, sir”—she bobbed her head, a deferential movement—“I do. Else you’ll be doing a lot of hard lifting that will make that wound become a lot more serious. Then you won’t be able to help anyone. You can take your ease for two days, under my say-so, and no one will think the worse of you for it. Your presence here has already been accepted. You don’t need to prove anything.”
“I am more than capable of helping out so we won’t be a burden,” Medusa said quickly. “She’s right. It’s best for you to heal properly, rather than make yourself worse.”
“Great. Three bossy women all in the same place.” But John’s expression said he understood the wisdom of Charlie’s advice; he just didn’t like to be inactive when others were working. He had always pitched in or pursued his own labors when she was doing chores on the island for her maintenance. But she would make sure he would care for himself, no matter who she had to snarl at, including John Pierce himself. If Charlie had Yvette’s support for the care of her patients, then Medusa would have no concerns about upholding her tenets, particularly where John was involved.
“Now, let’s care for you.” Charlie turned her attention to Medusa.
“Oh, I wasn’t wounded.”
“Not a physical wound, but it has been a stressful day for you. As I said, interdimensional travel takes its toll, especially on someone who has never done it before. My understanding is you went through multiple portals today?”
“Well, yes. But—”
“And you’re still healing from that recent wing break. That takes its toll, too. If you will let me give you ease, I think it will relax you, and help you integrate into the current here with less stress and fear. Would that be useful?”
It would. Clara had said that she should take advantage of the healing properties in Charlie’s massages. But the other things…
“Only a massage?”
Amusement touched Charlie’s lips, sensual and moist in their curve. “If that is all my lady desires, yes. If that is all your Sir desires as well.”
It was an odd way to reference him, but John didn’t seem uncomfortable with the address. That intriguing flicker merely went through his gaze again.
“Will you stretch out on the bed, my lady?” Charlie gestured to the wider couch, her words confirming Medusa’s thoughts on its dual purpose. When it was time to sleep, she hoped it was long enough for John Pierce’s tall frame. She didn’t want him cramped in their living space, though if this was a safe spot, she expected they could just as easily sleep under the stars, as they might have done on her island.
“It works better if you are unclothed,” Charlie said. “May I help you remove them? I will start by giving you an energy cleansing, and then we’ll move to the massage.”
Charlie’s voice lulled her like the flute music had charmed her snakes, but it was the look in John’s eyes that decided her. And what he said next.
“Lie down for her, sweetheart. You deserve some care under the hands of a woman.”
It triggered a wealth of memory. While she’d never been pleasured like the priestesses in the bathing chamber, she remembered being hugged often, her hair stroked or braided by the others as they listened to music, or Klotho read to them at bedtime. Once lights were doused, they’d curl up two or three to a mattress. She’d been so used to female contact. Getting accustomed to being without it had probably been one of the most difficult adjustments for her, though she’d pushed it into the back of her memory with those other painful things she didn’t like to think about.
Sometimes they’d squabbled if someone took more covers or more space than they each felt was their share, but when she’d had to sleep alone, and faced the prospect of doing so for the rest of her life, she would have given anything to take back any unkind words the girl she’d been might have said.
Charlie’s fingertips glided over he
r, figuring out the nature of her clothing before removing it. As she was undressed in the small wagon, she was standing so close to John she almost stood between his knees. His eyes did a leisurely appraisal of her. He’d seen her naked before, but she hadn’t had the opportunity to see him look at her like this, while someone was undressing her. Ostensibly for her care, but suddenly it felt like it was for him.
She noted the unique possessiveness in his expression, his gaze leaving heat in its wake. She felt suddenly like a concubine being undressed before her Master, knowing he would take her body at his pleasure.
Charlie paused and tilted her head. “Have you looked your fill, sir? May I take her to the bed?”
“I’d like her to turn around first.” John’s gaze lifted to meet Medusa’s eyes. “Turn for me, snake-girl.”
She wet her lips and complied, pivoting on her foot and presenting her back to him. His hands touched her backside, sliding over the curves to squeeze her buttocks. As her knees trembled, he pressed a kiss to her spine just above the rise of her bottom.
“Now you may lay her down.”
Charlie spread a sheet over the cushions and guided Medusa down onto her stomach on it. Her capable fingers trailed along Medusa’s back, backside and thighs to confirm her position. Medusa noticed her snakes had not discomfited the healer, even when Earthson and Tunneltrap brushed her shoulders or jaw, or slid along her upper arm.
“How long have you been here?” she asked Charlie.
“For a very long time, it seems. Or just yesterday.” Charlie had a non-intrusive laugh, barely more than a warm sigh that slid over exposed skin. It reminded Medusa not only of the quiet rush of surf along the shore, but the muted way she heard it far above the earth, in her nest above the patio. “Like many of us, my gifts, who I am, made me a prisoner of an ignorant and unspiritual world. Yvette discovered me and offered her invitation for me to be here. I’ve never yet had cause to leave.”